God or grounded thereon by a moral equity as some have untruly affirmed then neither private necessities nor publick reason of State can quit us from the guilt of Transgression thereof The Rule of Divines is which I firmly beleeve to be true Non licet in quavis necessitate leges Dei morales seu naturales violare i. e. It is not lawfull in any case of necessity to violate the moral or naturall lawes of God For example In the times of Persecution the ordinary commands of Persecutors were a Optat. lib. 3. Nega Deum Incende Testamentum Thus pone i. e. Deny thy God Burn the Book of God Worship the idol And these were injoyned upon pain of present torment and death And what greater necessity can be imagined then these and yet the Martyrs refused life upon such unlawfull conditions Joseph would not yield to adultry with his lady though he knew the consequence of imprisonment nor the 3 Hebrews Gen. 39. Dan. 3. worship the golden imâ—ge though they were assured of the fiery furnace All inconveniences dangers and necessities must submit to the moral law of God better it is to buâ—n or die then to deny Christ or blaspheme God and bear false witnesse There is a necessity to obey God but no necessity of continuing our naturall life by ungodly means In times of Persecution the Martyrs might have escaped torment if Necessity might have excused them But it is far otherwise in lawes meerly Ceremonial whether Jewish or Christian the transgression of this sort of lawes is excusable by necessity if it be a true real and pressing necessity in this case the Proverb will take place Aug. in Soliloq c. 2. To. 9. Necessitas non habet legem i. e. Necessity hath no law and Inter arma silent leges Lawes humane are dumb in time of Warr. Therefore because the Seaventh day Sabbath of the Jewes was meerly a law Ceremonial it might without sin upon necessity be slighted Upon this reason it was that Mattathias the wise and zealous Macchabean priest with his associates decreed and first taught the Jewes that they might upon necessity fight and repell their enemies on the Sabbath day as we read both in b Ios Antiq l. 12. cap. 9. 1 Mac. 2. 41. Josephus 1 Maccab. 2. 41. So likewise the Jewes of Antioch when they were by force of necessity compelled refused not to Work on their Sabbath day as the same Josephus reporteth And our Saviour excuseth his disciples for plucking eares of corne and causeth c Jos de Bello lib. 7 Mat. 12. Iohn 5. the impotent man to cary his bed and declareth that the priests who by their great labours about sacrifices in the Temple do profane the Sabbath yet are blamelesse Thus David did in necessity of hunger eat the holy Shewbread and the people of Israell for 40 yeares together in the wildernesse abstained from Circumcision as being very dangerous in their marches although it was imposed on them with great 2. Chron. 30. 2. Ex. 12. charge And in the dayes of Good Hezekiah the Passeover was celebrated in the second month which was otherwise then the law prescribed Ex. 12. All these things were done upon necessity or some usefull convenience without any offence to God * because the Sabbath day and Circumcision and Shewbread Num. 9. 11. and Passeover were but Ceremonialls and not morall lawes I doubt not but aged Eleazar the 7 brethren mentioned both by h Josephus d Iosep de Maccab. 2 Mac. c. 6. 7. and in 2 Macchab. cap. 6. 7. who were put to cruel tortures and death for refusing to eat Swines-flesh offered to Idols might have eaten thereof in that necessity and have saved their lives without offence to God because that law was but Ceremonial Only they knew their eating might have given Scandal or offence to their brethren the Jewes and therefore they abstained just as St. Paul saith in the like case 1 Cor. 10. 27. 28. Whatsoever is seâ— before you eaâ—e asking no question for conscience sake But 1 Cor. 10. 27. if any say unto you This is offered in sacrifice unto Idols eat not for his sake that shewed it Just so it is with our Christian Ceremonies whereof Sundâ—y is one and therefore the Solemnity and celebration therof in case of pressing dangers and necessities may be omitted But let us be sure that the said necessities be so indeed and not sinfull or contracted by our own faults or only pretended and then God will excuse us though some men will not Thus some Christians in time of Persecutions were condemned to the mines and listed under the title Metallicae Condemnationis and were forced there to sore work every day Sunday all as we read in Eusibius Hilarie Chrysostome â— Eus Hist l. 8. c. 13. Hil. cont Constant lib. â— Chrys de laudibus Martyrum hom 70. So at this day those Christians who are in Slavish captivity under the Turks are compelled to undergo hard labours even on Sundays and yet thereby neither the former Christian Confessors nor these do offend God which yet they would if our Sunday were a branch of the moral law of God There is not I think any good and prudent christian that doth not approve of most willingly submit to an holy celebration of our Christian Sunday although they do not think it to be enforced by virtue of the 4th CoÌ„mandment of the moral law or any equity thereof but upon another reason and ground because the equity pretended must be derived not from the Moral Sabbath but from the Jewish Ceremoniall Seaventh-day-Sabbath the equity whereof is only this That as God under the law required one day in seaven to be Sanctified as a figure and shadow of his people's rest in their Messiah to come So the Christian Church hath ordained one day in Seaven to be a memoriall of our rest in the same Messiah our Saviour who is come and our Sunday may also be called a kind of shadow as the Jewish Seaventh day was only their shadow went before the body as shadows somtimes do and our shadow followeth after the body for the body of both is Christ The Sabbath which is truly Moral and perpetual and which is intended meant and injoyn'd in the 4th Commandment is another manner of Sabbath much differing from the Jewish seventh day Sabbath or the Christians Sunday and is not such a sabbath as is by many now adayes supposed neither is the vigor and force of that Sabbath-Commandment as yet antiquated or expired but standeth in as full strength and in an obliging power as much or rather more then it had during the Jewish Synagogue or before the incarnation of our Lord. And I trust I shall make it appear that this Sabbath-law is written in our hearts evidently and convincingly as much or rather more than any other of those Moral Lawes and that this Sabbath was to be kept
Tacitus reporteth But most barbarously cruell was that fact of Parrhasiâ—s a Painter which is related by k Sen. lib. 5. cont 35. Seneca either as a true History or at least as a case in Law which then was casus dabâ—lis who toâ—tured his captive-servants in flames to death that so he might have a pattern to paint Prometheus by Nor was this all but for an aggravation of their miseries they were so far from being pittied that Poets and Players made them a common argument of publick mirth and derision in open Theaters wherein they were described as l Plautus catenarum coloni ulmorum Acharuns verberea statua Gymnasium flagri Plagipatidae Plagigeruli Sexcentoplagi c. And sometimes were forced to a part in some Tragedy of Phaeton or Hercules burning or of one crucified and in stead of dying in jest they were in earnest really put to death as appeareth by the Spectacula of m Mart. Spect. Ep. 7 Martial And this was done to please the people Thus were the Jews and Heathen-Gâ—ntiles cruell but God was and is mercifull and therefore in consideration of the hard-heartednesse and power of masters over their servants whereby they might by tortures compell them to work on forbidden daies he hath by this Law in such cases laid the transgression and consequently the punishment thereof not on the compelled servant but on the masters own head And there is no doubt but the equity of this ceremoniall Law of the Jews doth also reach the Christians and Gentiles All men are but servants and fellow-servants under one Master who in his Gospell hath thus threatned That servant which shall smite his fellow-servants shall be cut in sunder and shall have his portion with Mat. 24. 49. hypocrites Nor thy Cattle The mercifull Godhead by his Law taketh care even for poor cattle more then the Heathen Laws did for mankind as * Philo de Charitate Mosis p. 710 Philo observeth in imitation whereof the Jews had a Tradition belike from some of their holy Ancestors concerning mercy to be shewed to dumb creatures in distresse as Eusebius reports in these words †Euseb de Praep. l. 8. cap. 2. Nuilius animalis preces cum ad te lamentanti simile refugiat contemnas The meaning was that if a poor beast or bird pursued by ravenous beasts or birds or birds of prey shall fly to a man for safeguard he should protect it from the pursuer This provision for cattle is annexed to this sabbath-Sabbath-Law for two reasons 1. Because the Jewish-Sabbath was a type or figure of Rest not onely of mankind after the end of this world but also of the rest and freedom of other worldly and domestick creatures which are now subservient to man and toiled with labours as the Ox and Asse the Horse and Mule and Camell c. A mercifull man cannot chuse but many times to pitty and commiserate the excessive labours and daily slaughterings of the creatures of which the Apostle saith that one day They shall be delivered from the bondage under Rom. 8. 21 which the whole creation groaneth 2. Because the working of domestick cattle must needs require the assistance and co-operation of man Therefore it is here forbidden Nor the stranger that is within thy gates By this Law other Nations are not restrained from working on the Jewish Sabbath which did not at all concern them Onely if aliens or forrainers did sojourn within the Jewish-gates that is within the jurisdiction either Domestick or Politick of the Jews then the Jews are required to cause them to forbear working on their Jewish Sabbath day So that this restraint of aliens or strangers was confined to be onely within the Jewish limits and territories for strangers or aliens abiding in other places out of the Jewish pale were at liberty to work and for so doing the Jews are not by this Law required to forbid or hinder them That sons servants and even cattel are here placed before strangers the reason is 1 Because they are the Jews own peculiars of nearer relation and more subject to their commands than strangers are 2. To intimate that the Jews should first practise and obey the Law in their own persons and families for otherwise it would seem vanity pride or hypocrisie to require obedience or compliance from others There is a woe to such as lade other men with burdens which themselves will Luk. 11. 46. not touch with one of their fingers which may concern those which lay the restraint of Jewish Sabbatizing on others under the penalties of pecuniary mulcts or the Stocks or Sequestration which yet themselves sleight by marching travelling fighting and killing on the same day Certain Observations arising from this Exposition By what hath been said it may evidently appear to a diligent Reader that this seventh-day Sabbath was meerly Ceremoniall and concerned onely the Jews or Israeliticall people and not other Nations as may be collected from the premises for these reasons following 1. Because the transgression or violation of this sabbath-Sabbath-Law by sons or servants by command or compulsion of their Rulers is here declared to be the sin of the commander onely and not of the son or servant which could not be if this Law were Morall 2. If this seventh-day Sabbath-keeping were a Law Morall then it must follow that whosoever transgressed therein whether by his own will and election or by command or fear or compulsion greatly sinned Otherwise the Christian Martyrs might have been as well excused if they had worshipped the Heathen-Idolls when they were commanded by their lawfull Princes and moreover terrified by excessive torments and death But they knew that Idolatry was forbidden by a Law Morall and therefore refused to obey But this seventh-day Sabbatizing is not commanded by a Morall but onely by a Law Ceremoniall 3. These words Thou and thy son and thy daughter thy man-servant c. are not said of any other of these morall Laws Not of having other gods nor of Idols nor Perjury nor dishonouring Parents nor Murder nor Aduliery nor Theft c. Because sons daughters and servants transgressing any of these truly Morall Laws though by any command or terrour of their Governours yet the sin must be their own But if sons or servants did work on this Ceremoniall Sabbath by command and compulsion the sin was in the commander and not in the obeyer Therefore this must needs be a Ceremoniall Precept and not Morall and it is imposed on Parents Masters and Governours because the fault is not in the servants obedience to his Master but in the Masters disobedience to God The Apostle saith Children obey your Parents but Eph. 6. 1. Col. 3. 18. 20. 22. he addeth in the Lord. And again Wives submit your selves to your own husbands he addeth as it is fit in the Lord. And Children obey your parents in all things Servants obey in all things your masters he addeth Fearing God So that if their commands
one If they wil needs use the name of the Lord in calling that day 't were far more consonant with the phrase of Scripâ—ure and Euphony to call iâ— The Day of the Lord which yet will not come home to their purpose Therefore those prudent Sâ—atesmen and learned Prelates which were interessed both in composing our Statutes and also in compiling and authorising our Leiturgie did with great caution decline this appellation and call'd it Sunday as some of the most antient Fathers did before both in the Greek and a Iustin. Mart. Tertul. Latine Church and this in likelyhood before the appellation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Dominica was generally received although the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was in some particular Churches used before those Fathers wrote as may appear by that authentick Epistle of b Ignat. Epist 3. Edit Plant. Ignatius ad Magnesianos Neither did those Primitive Christians before mentioned who first began this solemnity nor the Apostles who approved thereof long before the Revelation was written ever call this day so as it is now called We find it recorded under the title of The first day of the week or first day after the Sabbath Act. 20. 7. and 1 Cor. 16. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but we find no mention of Sabbath Lord's day or Resurrection day nor did they then call it Sunday because the naming of the seven week-dayes by the seven Planets was never before or at that time used by the Jews nor by the Romans their then Magistrates Whereby it is evident enough that the assigning of the first day of the week for holy assemblies was not originally upon consideration of Christ's Resurrection on that day Notwithstanding the succeeding Church did conform unto that day because their Predecessors had fixed thereon And they further alledged new reasons for the retaining of it They considered That Christ did indeed rise that day from the dead That the descending of the holy Ghost at Pentecost That the creation of Heaven and Earth and Light That Manna rained from Heaven first and all these on this first day of the week Bellarmine addeth if you will believe him b Bel. de Cultu Sanct. l. 3. c. 11. To. 2. That by his and other learned mens calculations the Nativity of Christ fell on this first day of the week These were the reasons for retaining this day though not of instit uting it But in succeeding times the Jewish appellation of dayes by First Second Third c. of the Sabbath or Week was disused Therefore the Church affixed a new name to that day according to the Custom of their Country or Ordinance of the Church and hence came the denomination of Dominica and Sunday respectively We cannot with reason account this appellation Sunday to be any disparagement to the solemnity of the festivall in regard that our Saviour himselfe for whose Honour we sanctifie this Day is called by his Prophets The Sun which shall no more Isa 60. 20 Mal. 4. 2. Matth. 17 2. Matth. 13 43. Rev. 1. 16. 10. 1. 12. 1. go down And the Sun of Righteousnesse his glorious Transfiguration is resembled to the Sun his Saints are promised at their glorification To shine as the Sun his owne Countenance and his mighty Angell and his Spouse are described by the glory of the Sun so that this Name is high and glorious The disusing of this word Sunday and Dominica of late among us is upon some reason of State as of some other good old words also as The word Kingdome and Three Kingdomes and Bishop and Common Prayer Leiturgy and Letanie are now left And instead of them We have Common-wealth Three Nations Presbyters Independents Directory Sabbath Lords-day c. but oâ—d words may return again and new words may grow obsolete when the State seeth it needfull as one saith Multa renascentur quae jam cecidêre Horace cadentque Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula Si volet usus As for the warrant and authority for hallowing and assembling thereon We say That it is not grounded on the fourth Commandement which doth not in the least mention or meddle therewith Neither did Christ or any Apostle command it as Chemnitius a Learned Protestant granteth Exam. Conc. Trid. But we keep it rather by vertue of the fifth Commandement which requireth us to Honour our Parents wherein lawfull Magistrates are included and their just lawes authorized Our reasons are these 1. The institution of the Church Primitive 2. The Apostolicall approbation thereof 3. The Imperiall decrees and also the Regall lawes of this Realm 4. The constant practise of the Church Catholick in all ages thereof 5. The scripturall authority for it which is derived as is said before from the fifth Commandement although not directly or expressely and down-right but secondarily consequently and collaterally in these and the like passages Submit your 1 Pet. 2. 13 selves to eveâ—y Ordinance of Man for the Lord's sake And Obey them that Heb. 13. 17 have rule over you and submit your selves for they watch for your souls Christ also said If be neglect the Church Matth. 18 17. let him be as an Heathen man and a Publican For these and such like reasons we adhere to it and esteem them so ponderous that we account it an high insolency and pride either to abrogate or but to alter the day as some have attempted Thus far we agree in the thing but we dissent from the name Sabbath and Lords day and also from all superstition therein practised As touching the Mysterious Apocalyps from which the late appellation of Lord's day is taken by a Translation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is not rendred exactly to the Originall Letter as is shewed before Although this Scripture be still confessed both by the Church Protestant and Roman to be Theopneust and Canonicall yet it cannot be denied that many Learned men both Anciently and Lately have doubted concerning the Writer thereof and also have been anxiously perplexed with the obscurities therein First for the Writer That he was named John the Book often declareth But whether he were St. John the Apostle the Text doth not declare nor do the Ancients agree therein in so much that in consideration of former disputes concerning the Writer and also of the style phrase form or manner of speech therein used a Prolegom in Apoc. Beza is inclined to conjecture that if it were not written by St. John the Apostle yet that it was written by St. Mark the Evangelist who was also named John because we read of John surnamed Mark Act. 12. 12. and Act. 15. 37. But Beza's conjecture disagreeth with the History of St. Mark who is recorded by b Hier. in Marco St. Jerome to have suffered death in the eighth year of Nero c Origines Alexand. p. 38. Mr. Selden's Eutychius saith he died in the first year
first Heaven then Earth When the Heaven of Angels was made That their Heaven was intended principally for mankind Why Heaven and Earth are mentioned together Why the making of Hell is not mentioned although it was prepared within the first six daies Why the Creation is mentioned in this fourth Commandment and not in any of the other nine That the Morall Sabbath doth signifie the Creator which is God the Son That he is called the Beginning the Word and the Wisdom of God and is therefore here commanded to be sanctified CHAP. XX. The Exposition continued That all the divine persons co-operated and joyned in Creating Resting Blessing and Sanctifying How the Second Person or Son of God is the Rest or Sabbath of the same Son of God How he resteth in himself Of the divers considerations of God the Son in respect of his Godhead and Manhood Of his severall Appellations respectively Why the seventh day was preferred above the former six That the seventh-day-Sabbath was instituted for a memoriall of the Resting and 〈…〉 of God CHAP. XXI The Exposition concluded The meaning of blessing and hallowing the Sabbath day The difference of hallowing God's Name and hallowing of Creatures The differences of Holinesse When the seventh day was first hallowed How and when it was dis-hallowed Something of Sacriledge How the Prophets spake truly of things to come although they spake as if they had been past Of the Propheticall figure called Anticipation The directions of the Fathers and Scripturall examples thereof applied to this Sabbath CHAP. XXII Reasons why God having conferred honours on the seventh day did also lay some slurs upon it as 1. That this Day-Sabbath was not made known till Moses time nor at all mentioned by zealous David nor this Sabbath-Law by Christ 2. In that God expresly commanded some works on that day 3. That no Manna fell on it 4. That Christ lay dead on that whole day 5. That God called it but a signe and that it was nothing else 6. That it is said to be made for man 7. That it was impossible to be generally kept and also inconvenient occasionally to the Jews The Conclusion That the impossibility both of the seventh-day-Sabbath and also of the Morall Law was designed by God on purpose to drive man to seek for Rest and Salvation onely in the Lord Jesus Christ Errata PAg. 5. line 8. read force and necessity p. 8. l. 3. tell us p. 13. l. 27. Judaical p. 25. l. 6. Onera p. 26. l. 23. Judaical p. 32. l. 31. We are p. 34. l. 16. Judaico p. 37. l. 6. Speaketh p. 41. l. 23. Pharisaical p. 46. l. 34. killing law p. 48. l. 5. Law of God p. 65. l. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 89. l. 17. intermundium l. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 107. l. 6. God added p. 134. l. ult And in him p. 166. l. 16. judicial l. 20. judicial p. 168. l. 1. 10 act a part p. 227. l. 1. Jeremie In the Margin p. 13. l. 1. Ignatius p. 125. l. 3. Laertius in Diog. De minutioribus viderit lector The Mystery of the Sabbath Discovered The Sabbath Morall CHAP. I. The Church disturbed about the Doctrine of the Sabbath Of Sunday-Sabbatism Of works practised therein and Recreations forbidden That the celebration of Sunday is pious although not commanded by the Fourth Commandment How the Antient Patriarks did Sabbatize yet kept not a Seventh day That the ten Commandements are still in force A passage in St. Austin and Isychius explained and an abuse of the Commandements in the Roman Catechism shewed THE various opinions of men in the Doctrine of the Sabbath as it is delivered in the Fourth Commandment of the Morall Law hath more disturbed the Christian Church in these latter times then they did the Fathers the Zealous Christians in the Church Primitive yet then was the Doctrin of the Sabbath mistaken and perverted by Ebion who taught that Christians should necessarily keep the Jewish Hebdomarie or seventh-day Sabbath as some among us have done and is therefore by a Epiph. haer 30. Epiphanius and b Theod. haer fab Lib. 2. Theodoret branded with the mark of a Judaizing Heretick And now although the rejection of the Jewish Seventh-day-Sabbath is almost generally agreed among us yet a new Sabbath is set up on the Eighth day or first day of the week to be observed with as great strictnesse as the old Sabbath was on the Seventh day by the Pharisees for now not only labouâ—s are forbidden but also honest recreations such as we do not find to have been forbidden by those very Jewish zelots Which late strictnesse hath given an occasion or pretence to some to think it to be required rather in opposition to former permissions then for any new light or religious zeal because they have observed that by order of the same Superiors who forbad Recreations Souldiers have been commanded to march and the utensils and luggage of War Carts Wagons Artillary have been drawn out and most cruell bloody battells fought on that very new Sabbath-day and all this upon pretence of either private personall necessity or necessity publik which is now called Reason of State whereupon some of the approved Preachers of these times have openly in the Pulpit declared their dislike and said that now the State Civil is become like a Ship and the Church like a Cock-boat which must follow the motions and turnings of that Ship of State intimating hereby that our Religion must be reformed so as to be subservient to the interest and accommodations of the Civill governors which is quite contrary to the desires of those men who hoped and expected that their Kyrk should have bin made the Ship and the State should have bin the Cock-boat Mose and Aaron were brethren and agreed that Moses might be directed by Aaron in Spiritualls and Aaron Supported by the Brachium temporale or civill authority of Moses for stablishing true Doctrine and godly Discipline which formerly was the happy and peaceable usance of this kingdome wherein the state civill was supreme because as Optatus truly said against the disturbing Donatists c Optat. lib. 3. p. 83. Non est Respublica in ecclesia sed ecclesia in Republica est i. e. The Commonwealth is not included in the Church but the Church is in the Commonwealth And yet the civil power will not excuse those governors before God which authorise the breaking of the Commandments and Moral law of God For if the Seventh-day Sabbath practised in the Jewish Commonwealth or the Eighth among Christians which some yet call the Sabbath were indeed one of the ten Commandments of God which certainly are moral and perpetual then did the Jewes sin in performing the works of Warr and of Circumcision and Midwifery and Sacrificing at the Tabernacle and Temple on their Sabbath day And if our Sunday be really commanded by this morall law of
from the very Creation of man or from that very time when God commanded man to abstain from the Tree of knowledg And yet in this Assertion I shall not in the least gainsay the Doctrine of those Ancient and most learned Fathers as a Iust dial cum Tryph. Tert. Adv. Iudaeos Euseb de Demonst lib 1. c. 6. Justin Martyr and Tertallian and Eusebius who tells us that neither Adam nor Enoch nor Noah nor Melchisdeck did ever Sabbatize And b Athanas in Synopst Athanasius also who affirmed very truely That the observation of the 7th day sabbath be an not untill the dayes of Moses All which I firmly beleeve to be true provided that we understand their Assertion in the same sense that they meant it viz of the hebdomary weekly or 7th day Sabbath which verily is not that Sabbath which is meant mysteriously implied in the fourth Commandment For the Sabbath which in the fourth commandment is required to be Sanctified is the true substantiall mysticall and eternall Sabbath which is the Son of God the Messiah the great Peace-maker even the Lord Jesus Christ of which true Sabbath the Jewish Leviticall Ceremoniall or seaventh-day Sabbath was but a meer shadow type or figure which shadow is now vanished as other legal shadows are such as Circumcision and Sacrifices both which were farr more ancient then the weekly Sabbath was whereas the Sabbath meant and intended commanded in this 4th commandement was in force and kept by all the holy Patriarks before Moses was born and before it was written in stone it was written in man's heart as all other Moral lawes were and it was and is to last untill the end of this world and in the next world also and not to be Antiquated at all as the seaventh-day Sabbath was and is For the Moral law which was written by the finger of God consisteth of ten Commandments just so many no more nor lesse which number the holy Scripture mentioneth Ex. Ex. 34. 2◠34. 28. Ten commandments or Decem verba Foederis Tenn words And so again Deut. 4. 13. Tenn words or Commandments And God wrote them on two Tables of Stone to signifie the durablenesse of them all and therefore the Moral Sabbath there meant must continue as long and as firmly as any of the other nine We must still have Ten Commandments which is the reason that St. Austin and generally all our Divines to this day call this Moral law Decalogum as consisting of Ten words or Commandments The same Father in his book intituled a Aug. Tom 3. Speculum reciting the Moral law out of Ex. 20. doth quite omit the fourth commandment which is of the Sabbath and this he did because 1. He knew that the Seaventh-day Sabbath was none of the Moral laws of God but that it is totally antiquated and expired 2. Because he perceived that men did mistake the meaning of the true Moral Sabbath by fixing the duety thereby required only on the keeping holy of a day whereas they should have known that the Sabbath there meant is only Christ So that by this misconceit men slighted the Substance and magnified the Shadow for the same Father had said before b Aug. epist 86. Judaeus si sabbatum observando Dominum negat c. i. e. If the Jew by observing his Sabbath day doth thereby deny that his Lord Messiah is come how can the Christian safely observe the Sabbath day And again in his 119. Epistle to c Epist 119. cap. 12. Januarius cap. 12. he thus writeth c. Praeceptum de Sabbato solùm figuratè praecipitur de requie quae in solo Deo certa invenitur-ergo non ad literam jubemur observare diemillum nam nisi aliam Spiritualem requiem significet lex ridenda judicatur i. e. The law of the Sabbath day is only figurative signifying that Sabbath or rest which is no where to be found sure and certain but only in our God Therefore we are not hereby to observe a day as it is literally set down for unlesse some other Spiritual rest be thereby meant that Sabbath law might seem ridiculous Thus he Upon the same reason Isychius of Jerusalem affirmeth That the sabbath day which the Jewes observe is none of the Ten Commandements although it was written among them for the Sabbath there meant signifies d Isych in Levit. lib. 7. c. 26. Requiem intelligibilem saith he i. e. not a Corporal but a spiritual or intelligible Rest which rest is only in our God He added that if we will take the words going before viz I am the Lord thy God that brought thee out of the land of Aegypt for one of the commandments we shall still have Tenn Indeed The mysterious Sabbath which is really meant and intended in the morality of the 4th Commandement is only that God which delivereth us out of not only Egyptian but also Hellish Slavery which deliverance is implied and couched in this word Sabbath so that we need not put out one of the commandments and in the room of it take in a new for preserving the number of of Ten for that number will be found therein without such chopping and we are offended with the Romanists for such practises about these commandments who to hide the second commandement which forbiddeth image-worship have in their Catechisms quite omitted it although it continueth perfectly in their Bibles and to supply the defect they have obtruded the fallacy of Composition in making but one Commandment of the two first And the fallacy of Division in making two of the last as is apparent in their books and particularly in Ledesma's dial p. 81. Ferus libell precat p. 59. 60. the Catechism of Jacobus Ledesma a Jesuite and also of Ferus CHAP. II. The word Sabbath That it signifieth Rest Of the Rest of God and the Rest of man Of our rest Corporal and Spirituall The diffferences of Sabbaths The severall sorts of Jewish lawes which command or enforce the Sabbath The Judicial lawes of the Jewes not fit to be imposed on Christian WHat this word Sabbath signifieth we are certified by two learned Jewes first a Philo. de cherubin Philo saith Sabbatum interpretatur Quies i. e. The interpretation of Sabbath is Rest With him b Ioseph Antiq. l. 1. c. 2. Josephus agreeth Sabbatum significatrequiem i. e. that it signifieth quiet or Rest With them our Christian writers generally consent as Eusebius Nazianzen Epiphanius Jerome Austin The Rest which is signified by this word Sabbath is 1 The Rest of God mentioned Gen. 2. 2. God rested on the 7th day from all his works And so again Ex. 20. 11. How the most blessed Godhead can be said to rest which never laboured or was weary we shall inquire hereafter Secondly The Rest of man and this Rest is of two Sorts First Rest Corporal by ceasing from worldly servile labours on the 7th day both himself his family and his poor beasts
also Secondly Rest Spirituall which consisteth in the quiet and tranquillity of our minds and consciences when we are freed and quitted from the disturbing perturbations of our Consciences and turbulent horrors of our Souls upon consideration of our sinns and fear of divine vengeance This Spirituall rest is not confined to a Seaventh day only but is a continuall Rest or Sabbath to every holy Christian St. Austin saith a Aug. de Genesi ad lit l. 4. c 13. Fidelium perpetuum Sabbatum observatur i. e. The faithfull keep a continuall Sabbath And again he saith b Ibid. in Psal 91. Nostrum Sabbatum est in tranquillitate conscientiae est gaudium spei nostrae-intus est in corde Sabbatum nostrum i. e. The Christian mans Sabbath consisteth in the quietnesse and tranquillity of his conscience-It is the joyfulnesse of our hope Our Sabbath is inward residing in our heart We are also taught by St. Jerom that the Jewish Seventh day Rest was but a meer figure of the Christians Rest c Hieron Tom. 9. 11. n. 40. Judaeis Sabbatum in ocio corporali significabat sanctificationem in requie Spiritâ—s sancti i. e. The Sabbath which the Jews observed by a corporal rest did signify a Sanctification of the rest wrought by the Holy-ghost And Origen tells us d Orig. in Math. â—ract 29. Qui vivit in Christo semper sabbatizat a peccato i. e. He that doth live or abide in Christ doth alwayes Rest from sin His meaning is not that a Christian is alwaies without sin but that the infirmities of holy men do not discontinue or extinguish their resting in the mercies of God through Christ that they are freed from the dispairing terror of Damnation This is the true real and spirituall Sabbath or rest in Christ to which we are exhorted by old Ignatius e Inat ep ad Magnesianos Non Sabbatizemus Judaico mâ—râ—-sed Sabbatizemus spiritualiter i. e. That we should not deceive our selves by keeping a Sabbath day only as the Jewes did but to apprehend thereby a more excellent spirituall Sabbath viz. the true rest of our souls in Christ So bâ— these pâ—ssâ—ges we learn that there is not only a day Sabbath of externall and corporall rest to be considered in the Scriptural doctrine of Sabbaâ—hs but moreover principally a secret mysterious and spiritual Rest or Sabbath which is the Grand Sabbath whereof the other Sabbaths are but meer figures and shadows For the more clear understanding of the difference of these two sorts of Sabbaths we must inquire of the Originall of them as when and by what law they were inacted And this we cannot with plainness set forth but by examining the severall kinds of lawes imposed upon the Jewes whereby the Sabbath was both established in the judiciall commonwealth and is also binding to us Christians Wherein I shall not need to meddle with the Sabbath of years which was every Seaventh year wherein the whole land rested from husbandry Nor with the Jubilean Sabbath which was every fiftieth yeare when old owners returned to their ancient inheritances But our inquiry must must only be for the authority of the Saturday weekly or 7th-day Sabbath with the signification meaning and mystery thereof and what that true reall substantiall and spirituall Sabbath is which was but only typified by the Seventh-day Sabbath For the Jewish lawes we find 3 several diferent sorts of them viz. 1 Morâ—l 2. Ceremonial 3. Judiciall by all which the Sabbath is established all which lawes are distinctly mentioned as Expositors say by those words of Moses Deut. 6. 1. Now these are the Commandments the Statutes and the Judgments which the Lord your God commanded to teach you The ancient Latine Translation thus renders them 1. Praecepta to signifie the ten commandments 2. Ceremoniae to signifie the ceremoniall or Leviticall lawes 3. Judicia to signify the lawes Judiciall My designe of discoursing of them requires that I begin with the lawes Judiciall 1 The judicial Law 1. The Judicial law of the Jewes is such as we now call the law Politick Civill Common or Statute-law ordained for the ordering and governing of the commonwealth by this law punishments were enacted to be inflicted on the transgressors both of these judicial laws and also upon them that transgressed other lawes for by it Sabbath-breakers were punished with death Ex. 31. 14. And Ex. 35. 2. The gatherer of sticks on the Sabbath day is stoned to death Num. 15. 35. Idolaters are adjudged to be utterly destroyed Ex. 22. 20. To curse Father or Mother was death Levit. 20. 10. Bearing false witnes in matters capital was death Deut. 19. 18. 19. This judiciall I say appointed punishments for the transgressors of the other sorts of lawes when in those other lawes no punishment was mentioned for transgressours As in the ten commandments we find no visible nor temporal penalty mentioned for the sins of Idolatry Sabbath-breaking Dishonorers of Parents adulterers or falsewitnesses the punishment being either reserved to God or referred to the laws Judiciall or Politick There are some that have thought fit that these judicial laws of Moses should with some additions be made the laws Politick of Christians But I conceave that those laws are now most unfit for any Christian kingdome or State nor can they now have any binding power over us by vertue of that authority which they had from Moses or through him from God for these resons 1. Because they were ordained only for the Jewes commonwealth whilest it stood without any intention to continue them any longer 2. Many of them were enacted purposely to serve for the discovery of the Messiah to be an evidence of the fulfilling of some Prophecies which concerned the Tribe genealogy of Christ before his actuall manifestation in the flesh 3. Many of them are but Typicall therefore not to be used now since the Types are fullfiled by Christ the Antitype so that now they must needs be antiquated and quite out of date as well as all the other Leviticalls or ceremonialls which are typicall lawes are and ought to be disused such as Circumcision Sacrifices and New-moons c. 4. These judicialls would not be convenient for the very Jewes themselves now since the Death of Christ although they had to this day continued a People and State in their owne Country and City because the practise of these lawes would still harden them in their infidelity against the true Messiah as we see their Sabbatizing and Circumcising yet do Much lesse can they be fit for us Christians because of many and great inconveniences which would ensue thereupon Such as these 1. If the Jewish 7th year-Sabbath were in force with us wherein the whole land was to rest from Tillage and Husbandry as is commanded Ex. 23 11. and Levit. 25. 4. how many thousands of poor people would be famished and the richer people undone Indeed God did extraordinarily provide in such years
his Sermon on the Paralytick c Chrys Serm. 7. Tom. 5 Christus quando solvebat Sabbatum maximum aliquod meraculum edebat ut sic Sabbatismum auferret When Christ dissolved the Jewish Sabbath he did withall perform some great miracle that it might appeare that Sabbatizing was dissolved by Divine authority The ancient and grand Heretick Marcion upon this truth of Christs dissolving the Saturday Sabbath took occasion to ground his false heresie denying Christ to be the Son of that God who made the World and Ordained the Law supposing that the true son of the Creator would not null the law of the same Creator By this it appeares that even this Heretick so farr agreed with the Catholick Church as to acknowledg the dissolution of that Sabbath by Christ as Tertullian also doth in his writings against that Heretick whereof he gives this reason d Tert. Cont. Mar. Lib. 4. Quia Deus est Dominus Sabbati ergo destruere potuit i. e. Because our Lord Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath therefore he might dissolve it The same Father saith again in another book c De Idololatria c. 4. Nobis Christianis Sabbata extranea sunt sicut Neomen ia To us Christians Sabbatizing is a stranger as much as New-Moon dayes are This he wrote because he knew that Sabbath-keeping was a fading and temporary Ceremony as much as the feasts of New-Moons In some Epistles yet extant which passed between St. Austin and St. Jerome concerning their differing opinions in some Judiciall ceremonies St. Austin thus writeth and faith a Hier. Epist 97. Tom. 2. That after the death Resurrection of Christ â—hose Ceremonies also dyed but that they were to be allowed some convenient time for buriall and an honourable funerall And indeed the publick Preaching up of Christianity was their Funerall Oration and the Burning of the Temple was their Funerall pile But when these Sepulture-offices were once performed then those Typicall Ceremonies became not only dead but deadly pernicious and mortiferous To this St. Hierome addeth this aggravation b August In Barathrum Diaboli devolvunt eum qui observat to which St. Austin also consenteth To use those Ceremonies now is the ready way to drive men into Hell So St. Chrysostom having in his Sermons often forbidden the people under his charge to use Sabbatizing as the Jewes then did at Antioch where Chrysostome then was a preacher he adds c Chrys Homil Antioch 34. That after his admonition if any did Sabbatize himselfe was innocent of their blood So deadly did he think it And before him Origen had both affirmed and preached d Orig. in Jeremi Hom. 9. That now to observe Sabbaths is to return to those beggerly Elements of Ceremonies-Quasi nondum descenderat Christus That the Sabbatizer thereby declareth that he doth not beleeve that Christ is come who is the true Sabbath which now is to be kept For this cause it may reasonably be thought that our Lord Jesus neither at the dissolution of the Old Jewish Sabbath day nor at any time after did command or so much as intimate any new Sabbath day for Christians lest Christians also like the Jewes should erroneously think that the Moral precept for Sanctifying the Sabbath confisted only in the strict observation of a day and thereby utterly neglect the most holy most necessary and Grand Sabbath which is Christ who is the Only Sabbath that wee Christians can or ought to have For at this day we see that the Sabbath which is Commanded in the Fourth precept of the law Moral is by the greater number of people thought to be meant only of Sanctifying a day for so they are now taught by the greater number of our Preachers But herein the People deceive themselves and the Preachers deceive others for that Commandment hath a more noble excellent and beneficiall meaning then so as I trust will appear anone To the judgment of the Ancients before mentioned I crave thy patience good Reader that I may add one more of a late Writer the learned Mr. Mede which I esteem ponderous who in one of his books thus writeth a Mede Diatrib 15 We may not now keep the Jewish Sabbath lest we should thereby seem not to acknowledg our Vbi Bene Nemo meliùs Cassiâ—d de Orig. Redemption performed but expect still Their Sabbath was but a shadow Thus he most truly and correspondently with the Primitive Church It was indeed but a Shaddow of our Redemption by our Redeemer which being performed as the Psalmist speaketh it is passed away like a Shaddow By what hath bin said I trust the Reader Psal 144. 4. apprehends that the weekly Jewish Sabbath is no more but a branch of the Ceremoniall Law now Antiquated and by the authority of Christ himself totally abrogated So that I may for certain conclude that neither the Jewish seaventh-day nor any morall equity deduced from it can be that Sabbath which is injoyned to be Sanctified by the Moral Law of God Of which we are next to Consider CHAP. IV. Of Lawes Moral and why so called Of Sunday-Sabbatizing Of Origen and his Christian Sabbath That Saturday was a Church-day for Sermons Sacraments and Scripture-lessons and then also a fasting day long after Origens time Christians did more reverently keep Saturday then the Jewes themselves did that Sabbath Sunday not to be called Sabbath Easter day why altered from the Jewes Paschall day The author's reverend esteem of the Christian Sunday 3 The Morall Law THe third Sort of lawes recorded in the Scripture and imposed upon Gods People are the laws of the Decalogue the Ten Commandments Which Divines commonly call though improperly The law Moral So called because they were ordained as rules to guide and direct us in our demeanours or Manners for therin we find precepts Ethicall for our private persons against Murther Adultrey Theft Coveting And Oeconomicall for our deportment in a family as honouring of Parents Mercifullnesse to servants and poor Cattle And Political against Idolatry and for Reverencing superiors as Magistrates and especially Kings who are the Publick Parents of Subjects All these Ten Commandments are lawes Moral And more also they are lawes Naturall they are written in our hearts And more yet they were lawes and binding too before they were written in stone and so would be to the end of the World although they never had binne written therefore they are perpetuall all and every one of those Ten never to be abrogated or antiquated I say there are Ten of them although I do not beleeve or affirm that all the words in the fourth Commandment are so viz. the words which mention the seaventh day Sabbath of which I shall give an account anon for we shall find Ten without them The reason why I said that these Ten lawes are but Improperly called Moral is Because if we speak critically and Logically All laws whatsoever are Moral for all are but Rules for
Sabbath which in the fourth Commandment is so strictly required and that with a Memento also more than any other Commandment as being indeed the greatest of them all and most nearly concerning our everlasting Rest and Happiness as hereafter will appear CHAP. V. Of the Fourth Commandment what part of it is moral and what Ceremonial Why a Ceremonial is taken into the Ten Commandments Of the Memento and some other Prerogatives proper to this fourth Commandment The Excellent benefit of this Sabbath-law Why it is placed in the middle of the Commandments How the whole law is performable by men FOr the right understanding of this great mysterious Sabbath we must first diligently examin the words of the fourth Commandment which I here set down fully as I find them recorded Ex. 20. 8. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy Six dayes shalt thou labour and do all thy work But the seaventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God in it thou shalt not do any work thou nor thy Son nor thy Daughter thy man-servant nor thy maid-servant nor thy Cattel nor the stranger that is within thy Gates For in six dayes the Lord made heaven and earth the sea and all that in them is and rested the seaventh day wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it All our learned Divines generally agree thus farr that this Commandment is partly Moral so that the Moral part thereof is to be obeyed and kept at this day and also during the continuance of the world They also agree that part of it is Ceremonial appertaining only to the Jewes and binding them to the observation thereof until their Mâ—ssiah came in the flesh and was made known unto that people or during the Pedagogie of them or at most during the Judaical state and politie All this I conceive to be very true But the main difficulty consisteth onely in the right dividing this Commandment by seperating the Moral and everlasting part from that part which is but Ceremonial and temporal and typical Which that I may truely and Christianly perform I here most earnestly implore the assistance and illumination of thy Divine spirit O gratious Lord Jesus that in this needfull and concerning mystery I may appeare to thee and to thy Church as thy servant Paul exhorted Timothie a workman rightly dividing the word of truth For the understanding whereof I here present â— Tim. 2. 15. to the Consideration of the pious and learned Reader What after much labour of mind and long deliberation and after diligent and serious Consulation with the Ancient Fathers I have conceived to be the true and most necessary meaning of this Commandment and what is the right Division or Seperation of the Moral Mysterious and Perpetuall part thereof from that which is only Typicall Ceremoniall and Temporall And what part of that precept bindeth us Christians to observe it as it did also the Ancient Israelites and the Patriarks and Prophets and even Adam himselfe and all his posterity And also what part thereof was proper to and concerned only the Mosaicall or Judaical people and doth not at all concern the Christians or Gentiles nor did in the least oblige the Patriarks which lived and died before the dayes of Moses The want or neglect of a right distinction of these differing parts of this Commandment in our later Theological Writers hath occasioned much trouble heart-burnings and Schisms among Christians and also many Phraisaicall curiosities in the observation of an eighth day Sabbath Which was never intended to be put upon the people of God by this 4th Commandement And moreover it hath also obscured the most needfull most holy and Mysterious Sabbath Spirituall by which we only can expect an eternall and heavenly Sabbath and salvation of our Souls and bodies For many good pious and well-meaning Christians are hereby mislead into the same arror and mistake that the Jews were in by thinking that the whole and ultimate duty commanded and intended in this 4th Comandement consisteth only in keeping holy One day of Seaven Which is but a very mean and low conceipt and far short of the High and Weighty intendment of that Precept and is also a very stumbling Block in the way to retard men from apprehending the true Sabbath therein secretly and mysteriously Veiled Which is Christ Who only is the everlasting Sabbath or Rest both of the Godhead and also of us Men. It is now time that I set down plainly what I conceive to be the Moral part of this Commandment and in what words it is contained that so it may appear how much of that long Precept concerneth us at this day and is an everlasting Law and a law Naturall and Written in Mans heart and binding not only Christians and Jews but Heathens and even all Nations as also it did all the Patriarchs before Moses was born and before it was written in stone These are the words Ex. 20. 8. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy In these few words is contained the whole Morality of that Law So that no more of the words are to be accounted Moral or binding us for all the following words are but a branch of the Ceremoniall law And although they are here joyned with the truly Moral Sabbath and also by the same God written in the same Tables of Stone Notwithstanding this will not make them to be a Moral law because they are so annexed for this reason only to serve as a Type and figure of the Grand Sabbath To keep the Israelites mindfull by a weekly Sabbath or rest of that everlasting Rest which they were to expect in their Messiah and not otherwise For now we see that all learned Divines have rejected and the whool Christian world have long since disused the old Jewish Typical or Seaventh-day Sabbath These later words which are so annexed to the fourth Morall Law are to be considered by themselves in their proper place but for present we must insist only on the former words which I have affirmed to be truly moral and an everlasting law For the understanding whereof the Reader may observe divers things Considerable and some of them proper and peculiar to this Commandment so as not to be found in any other of the Nine 1. In those words recited There is no mention of the Seaventh day for that was meerly Typical and Ceremonial but the Sabbath-day Therefore surely there must be understood some other Sabbath day besides the Seventh day Sabbath for otherwise it had bin enough to have said Remember the Seaventh day to keep it holy But the Seaventh day is one thing and the Sabbath day is another They differ as much as Shadow and Substance as Type and Antitype as Signum Signatum i. e. as the bare signe from that which is signified thereby for the Jewish Seaventh-day-Sabbath which was but only a signe and shadow of the Substantial Mysticall and Spiritual Sabbath which is Christ 2. To this
be the Lord. The Scriptures often mention Sabbaths in the plural number as Lev. 19. 3. Keep my Sabbaths and also Sabbath in the singular numbâ—r and I doubt not but the Jews were charged to keep other Sabbaths as that which is appointed in the Feast of Trumpets Levit. 23. 24. and that in the Feast of Tabernacles Levit. 23 39. and that in the Feast of Atonement Levit. 23. 32. as well as the weekly Sabbath because we find that transgressors of the yearly Sabbath are threatned with destruction as well as the breakers of the weekly Sabbath Levit. 23. 29. But now all these Ceremonial Sabbaths are vanished This being granted it will follow in regard of the authority and perpetuity of the Moral Law of God That there must needs be some one special singular and mysterious Sabbath of greater necessity and concernment to be still kept than all those Hebdomarie or Annual Sabbaths and that surely is Christ The Lord Paramount of all Sabbaths which were but shadows of him Whosoever therefore shall imagine that the keeping of any weekly or yearly Day Sabbath is the principal or only duty required in this Moral Law he is such an one as the Psalmist describeth Psal 397. A man that walketh in a vain shadow It is very considerable and surely for some weighty reason That our Saviour very often in the Evangelical Histories occasionally mentioning these Moral Laws and many of them distinctly and severally yet never spake in the least expresly and openly of the Sabbath Law although that fourth Commandment so far as it is Moral is as necessary to be pressed and rather more than any one or indeed then all the other as is shewed before And yet it is not to be doubted but that he meant and also did covertly press this very Sabbath Law in the true intent and meaning thereof to be for ever carefully observed and sanctified I do not take upon me to render a full account of what moved Christ to forbear the reciting of that Law so openly as he did other Moral Laws of the Decalogue yet it may reasonably be thought that he on design and purpose omitted that Law and indeed all the particular Laws of the first Table because he saw that the Jews did misunderstand that Commandment of the Sabbath and that they were zealously obdurate for keeping the seventh day Sabbath as if that had been the full and only intendment and duty required by that Commandment for if Christ had urged it the Jews had been by him countenanced in their erroneous Sabbatizing which he came to dissolve therefore he forbare the naming of that particular Law and for the same cause he abstained from mentioning any of the other Laws of that Table lest if amongst them this Law should be omitted without any mention the Jews would have been more exasperated against him before his time was come to suffer This omission of the Sabbath Law the Reader may observe Mat. 19. 17. Where Christ said If thou wilt enter into life keep the Commandements And when he was asked Which Commandments he answered Thou shalt not murther nor commit adultery nor steal nor bear false witness and Honour thy Father and Mother and Love thy Neighbour as thy self See the same again Mark 10. 19. and Luke 18. 20. In all which places there is no express mention of the Sabbath Law or of any other Law of the first Table But when he was more strictly questioned by a knowing-man a Lawyer or Scribe being a Professor of the Law Mat. 22. 36. Master which is the greatest Commandment in the Law Yet then he answered him but in general terms including the Laws of both Tables without mentioning any one particular Law of either Table thus Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart c. This includeth all the four precepts of the first Table Sabbath and all He that performeth this doth thereby keep the Sabbath Therefore to love honour and sanctifie our Lord Jesus Christ who is our only Lord God our God Incarnate the Emmanuel our Creator Redeemer and Saviour is to keep this Moral Sabbath for he only is that Sabbath which is mysteriously commanded to be sanctifyed in that Law this Sabbath Law continueth in full force and vigour at this day and so shall to the end of this world and for ever when all other observations of seventh-Days or any other worldly Sabbaths are quite forgotten and vanished for the true intended Sabbath is a Person Christ the Son of God and the Son of man Finally This Commandment which I have set down in these words Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy is certainly a Moral and an everlasting Law This Sabbath if it be confessed to signifie Christ we have what we desire but if it should signifie only the keeping of a Day whether the last day of the week as the Jews think or the first day as some Christians suppose then surely the not keeping of one at least of these two days is a sin and must be so accounted now under the Gospel for the Apostle tells us 1 Ioh. 34. Sin is the transgression of the Law He means the Law Moral But we are well assured that the Gospel doth not account the Not-keeping of both or either of those days to be a sin against the fourth Commandment or against any other of those ten Moral Laws except indirectly and by consequence for in all the New Testament we cannot find such Sabbath-breaking to be so much as once mentioned in any of the black Rolls of sins as other transgressions of all those Commandments are particularly and often by the great Apostle See 1 Cor. 6. 9 Neither Fornicators nor Idolaters nor Adulterers nor effeminate nor abusers of themselves with mankinde nor Theeves nor Covetous nor Drunkards nor Revilers nor Extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God See more Gal. 5. 19. Uncleanness lasciviousness wiâ—chcraâ—t hatred variance emulations wrath strife seditions heresies envyings murthers revilings and such like See more 1 Tim. 1. 9. Lawless disobedient ungodly and sinnâ—rs unholy and prophane murtherers of fathâ—rs and of motherâ— man-slayers men-stealers such as are now called Spirits â—yars perjured persons Among all this Rabble we find not Sabbath-breakers Yet the abusers or neglecters of the true Moral Sabbath which is Christ are deeply threatned as Judas for betraying him the Jews for crucifying him and All that shall deny him So the Sanctifiers of him are gloriously promised as the confessors of him the believers in him the relievers of him or of his poor Members for his sake to be rewarded with the kingdom of Heaven This is the Scriptural Doctrine concerning the Sabbath-ship of Christ What the Church Catholick conceived thereof is next to be enquired CHAP. VII The Doctrine of the Primitive Church concerning the Sabbath shewed out of Tertullian and other Fathers How the Patriarks kept the Sabbath before the days of Moses The Doctrine of the Church of England
herein The meaning of Prayers at the rehearsing of the ten Commandments How the Law may be written in our hearts and how it is performable by men TErtullian in that Book which he wrote against the Jews affirmeth That the Law which God imposed upon our first Parents in Paradise was obligatory both to them and also to all the world in their succeeding generations which Law if they had obeyed had been a Law large enough He saith again a Tert. Advers Iudaeos In hac lege Adae datâ omnia praecepta condita recognoscimus quae posteâ— pullul averunt data per Mosem In that Law which God gave to Adam all the Laws of Moses were secretly couched And again b id lib. Primordialis lex est data Adae Evae quasi matrix omnium praeceptorum Dei i. e. That first Law given to Adam and Eve was as the womb of all the Laws of the Decalogue Then he reckoneth up all the Moral Laws first generally as Christ doth Mat. 22. 37. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God wiâ—h all thy heart And Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Then he particularly mentioneth the Laws of the second Table Thou shalt not kill Not commit adultery Not steal Not bear false witness Honour thy Father and Mother Thou shalt not covet Now the Law given to Adam was only in these few words Of the tree of knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat Yet in them all the Laws of the Decalogue saith he are implied His reason is If they had so loved God They would not have disobeyed his Command If they had loved their neighbour that is one another themselves and their posterity they would not have killed them by bringing in Mortality and Original corruption of Lust Nor would they have stolen the fruit which belonged not to them Nor hâ—ve complied with the Serpent's false witnessing concerning the fruit Nor have dishonoured their Father and Creator by that Transgression Thus he From this passage we may observe that in the judgement of this Learned Father the whole Decalogue having been thus imposed upon our first Parents therefore the Law of Sabbath keeping amongst the rest must needs be put upon them We observe again That it being confessed by this Father in the same Book and immediatly after the words before alledged That neither Adam nor Abel nor Enoch nor Noah nor Melchisdeck nor Abraham did ever Sabbatize although the whole Decalogue was imposed on them also so as is said and although the laws of the Decalogue be every one of them the law of Nature and therefore written in mans heart and also that all those Patriarks must be obliged to keep this Sabbath law as well as any of the other Nine This being granted how shall we quit this learned Father from contradicting himself in these two propositions first The Patriarks were bound to keep the Sabbath second The Patriarks neither did nor were bound to keep the Sabbath This Riddle is easily unfolded by distinguishing the Sabbath Moral from the Sabbath Ceremonial that is The true Real Natural and Substantial Sabbath from the Figurative Typical and Umbratical Sabbath Or. the Body from the Shadow We affirm therefore that the Jewish Hebdomarie seaventh-day or Saturday-Sabbath was but the shadow or type and that the Messiah even Jesus Christ our Lord Emmanuel was and is the true substantial Sabbath and the true Spirit and meaning of that Sabbatical law and is the Lord of the Hebdomarie or Typical Sabbath We also affirm that neither Adam nor any of those forenamed Patriarks did ever keep or sanctify any seaventh-day or Saturday-Sabbath and also that such a Sabbath day was never known or imposed on Gods people before the dayes of Moses And for this we have the confession of a learned Jew even Philo more than once a Philo. de vita Mos lib. 1. Israelitae ignorabant mundi nat alem prinsquam ex Manna didicissent i. e. The Israelites knew not the first day of the world until the Manna fell therefore not the seaventh day Again he saith b idem lib. Ante Mosem Sabbati diem ignor abant homines Before the time of Moses men were ignorant of the Sabbath day This he affirmeth although with a Judaical excuse as if the former knowledg thereof had bin obliterated by Calamities But we also confess and firmly believe that all those holy Patriarks were bound and therefore did certainly keep and sanctify the true substantial Sabbath before Moses was born for their Sabbath was the Son of God even their true and onely Lord God who in due time was to take our humane nature on him So to be the Emmanuel in our nature to perform the whole Law which the Godhead imposeth on man in our steed and this not only by an actual keeping and performing the Commandments but also by a passive obedience in suffring the punishment of our transgressions to quit his faithful ones from the sentence of condemnation and thereby to give comfort ease tranquillity and so a Rest or Sabbath to our otherwise wearied and trembling souls For Christ only is that promised Seed of the woman which should bruise the Serpents head the birth manifestation of him in the flesh is that day which our father Abraham rejoyced to see and he is that well beloved Son in whom alone the Godhead is well pleased and resteth satisfied and at peace with us If those holy Patriarks had not kept this Sabbath they could not enter into the eternal Sabbath of heaven That Christ only is the Sabbath Moral to the sanctification whereof we all are perpetually obliged was the Doctrin of the Ancient Church as may appear by many expressions of the Fathers Origen saith a Orig. in Math. Tract 29. Qui vivit in Christo semper Sabbatizat He that liveth in Christ liveth in a continual Sabbath The holy man Macarius calleth the weekly Sabbath b Marcar Hom 35. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. but a Typical Sabbath and saith It was onely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. That it was but a branch in the shadowie or Ceremonial Law But Hoc est verâ—m Sabbatum vera requies animae quae conquiescit in verâ quiete laetitià Domini The true Sabbath is the quiet of our souls resting in tranquillity and joy of our Lord. Thus he After him Epiphanius most evidently declareth the same Doctrin more than once for thus he writeth c Epiph Haer. 8. In lege figurae erant in Evangeâ—io veritas illic Circumctsio inservit usque ad magnam Circumcisionem id est Baptismum illic Sabbatum detinens in maâ—num Sabbatum id est Reqâ—iém in Christ Under the law were figures but the truth of them was shewed in the Gospel in the Law carnal Circumcision was used until the great Circumcision by Baptism came in There was a Sabbath also which lasted until the great Sabbath came which is our
these thy Lawes in ouâ— hearts we beseech thee This prayer is grounded on the promise of God recorded both in the Prophets and also in the Gospel Jer. 31. 33. Heb. 18. 10. I will put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts If we enquire what that Law is and how God doth write it in our hearts and to what intent it is done The Answer is That this Law is Christ The putting or writing of it in our hearts is the mission of the Spirit of Jesus into us The intent or purpose thereof is that by a spiritual union of Christ with us we may fulfill the Law For because Christ and his Members are united by this Spirit and so become one mystical body therefore what Christ hath done in obedience to the Law must be accounted as our obedience and so imputed to us that because he hath performed the Law we also in him have performed it The Apostle tels us a 2 Cor. 13. 5. Jesus Christ is in you and b Gal. 2. 20. Christ liveth in me and c Eph. 3. 17. Christ may dwell in our hearts And Christ himself saith d Matth. 28 20. I am with you alway even unto the end of the world And the Apostle again e Gal. 3. 28. Ye are all one in Christ Jesus And that we may know that when we have the Spirit of Jesus in us then we have also the Lord Jesus himself in us Another Apostle tels us f 1 John 4. 13. Hereby know we that we dwell in him and he in us because he hath given us of his Spirit But how shall it appear That the putting of Christ into us is the putting of the Law of God into our hearts The Answer is That Christ is the Law there meant and he is called the Law and is really the Law * Moses is called by Phâ—lo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 much more is Christ so and not only so but he is moreover The Law with all advantages to us for he is the Law fulfilled That Christ is called the Law the Psalmist tels us a Psal 2. 7. Rom. 8. 2. I will preach the Law whereof the Lord hath said unto me Thou art mâ— Son Here the Son is called the Law or Precept of the Lord. Then that Christ is the Law fulfilled or the fufilling of the Law Of him it is said in another Psalm b Psal 40 10. Heb. 10. 7 In the volume of thy Book it is written of me that I should fulfill thy will O my God I am content to do it yea thy Law is within my heart And this Christ himself professed c Mat. 5. 17. I am not come to destroy but to fulfill the Law This also was signified by his Type the Ark wherein d Heb 9. 4 the Law was put for the Ark represented Christ and the Law in it signified that Christ should keep that Law and this he did perform only to our behoof that his obedience might be accounted ours Upon this reason only it is that the Apostle so confidently saith e Phil. 4. 13. I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me If he can do all things then he can do all the works of the Law But we are well assured that he could not in his own proper person alone considered perform the Law but it must needs be thus only performed by him in and through Christ And in this consideration only Christ is our Rest and Sabbath For this reason our Church prayeth that God would incline our hearts to keep this Sabbath-law which is Christ That by keeping him the whole Law of God may be kept by us through and in him so as is here expressed by having the Law thus written in our hearts Thus this Moral Law which as Divines acknowledge is altogether impossible to the Natural man especially as it is exegetically aggravated and heightened in the Gospel is by this Sabbath made possible and easie to the Matth. 5. Spiritual man so the Apostle tels us a Rom. 10 4. Christ is the end or perfect on of the Law for righteousness to every one that believeth that is He that believeth in Christ hath the benefit of performance of the Law brought home to him So St. Ambrose tels us b Ambr. in loc Perfectionem leg is habet qui credit in Christum CHAP. VIII That Christ is called a Day Why Christ and the seventh day are both called Sabbath The first Institution for keeping holy the seventh day Why the first seventh day of the World is described without Evening and Morning The Sabbath described by Philo Parallel'd with Melchisedech and both Types of Christ IF Jesus Christ be the only Sabbath which is mysteriously covered and spiritually meant and really and ultimately intended in the Moral part of this fourth Commandement as certainly he is because he only is our Redeemer our Mediator and the Peace-maker of God with man We must next enquire how this Sabbath if it be so understood can be called a Day as here it is Remember the Sabbath day for by this word Day a man may reasonably-imagine that the principal intendment of this Precept was only for the Celebration or Sanctifying of a day as the Jewes do yet think and many good Christians among us do still though erroneously believe although they agree not in the self same day with the Jews Their reason is because not only in this former part of the fourth Commandement which I have shewed to be a Morall Natural and an everlasting Law but also in the latter words annexed which are a part of the Law ceremonial and therefore but temporal and transient it is also said The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God by which words a man at first hearing would think that the Sabbath in both parts of this Law is nothing else but a day for if the seventh day be a Sabbath why may not the Sabbath be thought to be a Seventh day 1. Our Answer is That the seventh day is called a Sabbath because it was a type and figure of our true Sabbath and Rest which is Christ as the Jews corporal rest was but a figure of our spiritual rest in Christ And because it was so appointed for a figure or sign therefore it hath the name of the thing figured or signified thereby as other signs and types have for so the Paschal Lamb is called the Passover yet we know Christ only is the true Passover as the Apostle tels us 1 Cor. 5. 7. So the Rock is called Christ 1 Cor. 10. 4. So of the Eucharistical bread it is said This is my body though it was but a Sacrament or holy sign of the body of Christ And the seven Eares are seven Yeares Gen. 41. 26. Just so the seventh day is the Sabbath that is the sign type and figure of the mysterious Sabbath which is Christ 2. As the sign hath
obedience of that Law which is imposed on him by the mighty Creator of Heaven and Earth In the first of these Laws which a man would imagine to be the greatest God useth only this motive I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the Land of Egypt This was to move them by way of gratitude to adhere only to him their Deliverer and not to acknowledge any other God But the motive used in this fourth Commandement of sanctifying the Sabbath is far stronger because the deliverance of his people out of bondage might possibly have been performed either by Treaty or by the Arme of flesh without those plagues of Egypt and wonders at the Red Sea for the Israelites were numerous enough to have fought the Egyptians and to subdue them they wanted only Arms and Utensils of Warr which yet might reasonably have either been forced from the Egyptians or supplied by a forrain power we well know â—gypt was not invincible having been so often subdued Now the motive used in this Sabbath Law is proper only to the Almighty and absolutely incommunicable to any Creatures for none but God did or could make heaven and earth which is generally confessed by Heathens Jews and Christians Plato called God a Plut. in Symp. c. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So by Philo the Jew he is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And by Dyonis Areop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And by Nâ—z 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And by St. Paul b 2 Cor. 6. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is but The Almighty Father and Maker of the World Among the wise Sentences of old Pythagoras this is recorded for one If any man come and boast that he is God let him create another World and we will believe him And in the holy Scripture This making of Heaven and Earth is often mentioned as a peculiar character of the true God As In the beginning Gen. 1. 1. God created the Heaven and the Earth And Psa 146. 5 Happy is the man whose hope is in the Lord his God which made Heaven and Earth So it is in the New Testament Acts 14. 15. and 17. 24. And by this the true God is differenced from false Gods as The gods that have not made Heaven and Earth shall perish And All the Jer. 10. 11 gods of the Nations are Idols but the Lord made the Heavens And this character of God is put into the very front of our Creed First As a strong motive to incline us to believe and trust in him Secondly To inform the weaker sort of Christians who cannot appreâ—â—end what God is or what to make the object of their faith That it shall be requisite and sufficient for them at first Tâ—â— believe in God under this notion thus Whatsoever he is that made Heaven and Earth in him do I believe for so the Psalmist declareth My help Psa 121. 2 cometh from the Lord which made Heaven and Earth This great motive here used to incline us to sanctifie the Sabbath doth evidently shew that this sabbath-Sabbath-Law is of greater concernment to us than the first Law is The reason whereof we have declared before * Chap. 5. And moreover That the Sabbath which is here principally meant doth not consist in keeping of a day whether the last day of the week which God imposed upon the people of Israel only and that but for a certain time Or the first day of the week which God never at all commanded But another kind of Sabbath is here commanded to be sanctified which Sabbath being rightly and deeply considered will prove and appear to be that very same Lord God that made Heaven and Earth For we have proved before First That the Sabbath day mentioned in the Moral part of this Commandement doth signifie God the Son because in him only the Godhead can be truly said to Rest and not otherwise Secondly We have proved That the Jewish Seventh day Sabbath was appointed only to be for a type figure and memorial or commemoration of that true and grand Sabbath which is Christ From these premises we here inferre That the making of Heaven and Earth is mentioned in this Commandment on purpose for a motive to incite us to a serious and most reverentiall sanctification of this true reall and substantiall Sabbath because he that is here called the Sabbath day is the great Day-spring from on high and is really He that made heaven and earth So that if we will acknowledge that the Creator of heaven and earth is to be worshipped and sanctified by us then must we also confesse that this Sabbath which is the Son of God is so to be sanctified No learned or prudent Christian I suppose will deny that this Son of God was the Creator of Heaven and Earth or if any do the Scriptures and primitive Church will gainsay them The Fathers expound these words Gen. 1. 1. In the beginning God created to signifie God the Father in God the Son And Joh. 1. 1. In the beginning was the Word that is the Word or Son was in the Godhead even that Word by which all things were made For the Word Principium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a Tert. Advers Herm. Tertullian observeth doth not signify onely Ordinativum i. e. a Beginning in respect of the order of time but Potestativum i. e. a Primacy in power and authority For from this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Princes Potentates and Magistrates on earth are by him called * Id. Advers Iâ—daeos Archontes and by others Demarchi i. e. Powers Princes and Rulers of People One of the sayings of Pittacus the Philosopher was b Laert. in Pittac 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Magistracy or power will show the disposition of a man Hence also are the words Archangelus in St. Paul Archiepiscopus in Chrysostome and Epiphanius and Archipresbyter and Archidiaconus in St. * Hieron Epist 4. Jerom. As to the appellation Word The Psalmist saith By the Word of the Lord the heavens Psal 33. 6 were made just so the Evangelist tells us All things were made by him That this Word was Joh. 1 3. God the Son every one knowes The Psalmist saith again vers 9. Let all the Earth and all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of of him for he spake the Word and it was done The Word by which the world was made and of which Moses thus wrote God said Let there be light and Let there be a firmament is not to be thought a transient or vocall word as Austin saith c De Civ lib. 11. c. 8. Non sonabili verbo sed intelligibili And by such a word as d In Ioh. Tract 37. Manebat non sonando transibat i. e. The world was made by that internall and substantiall Word which did not passe away from God as our words do from us but by his Word permanent of which St.
in God who is the Fountain of all inherent Holiness and is Holiness it self which we are to acknowledge and which we do confesse when we pray Hallowed be thy Name Secondly There is an Holinesse Moral or of Qualities derived from God the Fountain thereof such is in holy Men as Piety Righteousness Justice Truth Sincerity â—ear and love of God Faith Hope Charity This is that which Divines call Inherent Holiness Thirdly There is an Holinesse by Dedication or Assignment as of Places Vessels Vestments Men and other Creatures and of Times as this Hallowed Sabbath day is Hence we say holy Temple holy Church holy Day holy Eâ—charist for the Bread and Wine to be used therein are of themselves but Elements but after Dedication or Consecration of them or Hallowing which our fore-fathers called Howseling them to that Mysterious use we Fox in Hen. 8. call them Sacraments Divines call this Holinesse Relative It is but a srivolous cavil or excuse of Sacrilegers who make no scruple of abusing or demolishing hallowed places as Churches and Chappels or robbing them of their vessels goods lands and Revenues which were consecrated because they say such things have no holinessâ— or holy qualities inherent in them as no pieâ—y no faith or hope c. I wish such to consider also what inherent holinesse the Jewish Sabbath had or Achan's Wedge of Num. 15. 35. gold or Ananias his money except only the Josh 7. 25. Act. 5. 5. holinesse or hallowing of dedication or destination Yet the profaning and subducing of these was punished by stoning burning and by sudden death and all this by the Sentence of God himself although the hallowing in the case of Ananias was not by God but voluntarily only by himself It may reasonably be feared that the strict injunctions and commands of some such Sacrilegers for observing the Christian Sunday which was not hallowed by any Command of God but only of Men will one day condemn their abuses of other things which were also â—hallowed by Men as Christ said Ex ore tuo serve nequam c. But then the Sabbath-day having been thus hallowed or sanctified by God How comes it to be unhallowed and laid common with other dayes Would God revoke that which himself had constituted Or durst Man presume so to do This seemeth to thwart that heavenly Voice which said to Peter in a like case What God hath cleansed call not thou Act. 10. 15 common To this our Answer is First Man might not presume to alter or null any of Gods Ordinances without Divine warrant But the dissolution of this Sabbath-day was done by the grand Warrant of the Son of God and by him then when he was the Great Son of Man Secondly We say That God never unhallowed or revoked any Sanctions which Himself ordained during the time and purposes that were by him intended for them to continue in force and use For some Divine Constitutions were inacted to continue but for a set-time as the Types were Sacrifices Circumcision Passover Tabernacle and this Sabbath all which and many such were but Ceremonial Sanctions But others were ordained by him to continue to the end of the World as all the ten Commandements which are Sanctions Moral These God never yet revoked nor never will But the other sort which were but Ceremonials and intended to last but during the Pedagogie of his People and so for a certain limited time viz. untill the manifestation of the Son of God in the flesh Which being accomplished those temporary Ordinances were to cease and this without any Mutability on Gods part or Sacrilege of Men. Just as when a Man gives a pension or rent to a pious use for a limited time of ten twenty or thirty yeares and no longer when that time is expired the Pension may cease without any Sacrilege of the Doner Hallowed The principal Question in this hallowing which hath most perplexed the minds of many good Christians is concerning the Time when God did actually hallow or set apart the Seventh day whether on the first Seventh day of the World or whether not before the dayes of Moses and the Egyptian deliverance To this we answer confidently and resolutely That although it is most certain that God did rest on the first Seventh day of the World but so as hath been at large shewed before yet he never appointed or hallowed a weekly Seventh day for Man's rest untill the dayes of Moses Our Reasons for this Assertion are these First If the weekly Seventh day had been hallowed at the beginning as a Law it must have been either written in Mans heart as all Moral Lawes of God were ever since Man was made or else it must have been openly declared as a Law positive But the Seventh-day Sabbath was not written in Man's heart For if so then it must have bound all Nations in all Ages which as yet it never did Neither was iâ— then declared overtly as a Law positive for if so then certainly we should have found some mention or footsteps of it in the History of the Patriarks which lived before Moses But we â—ind nothing of it in all that long time and we are well assured that neither Adam nor any of his posterity did ever so Sabbatize untill the dayes of Moses This is the Doctrine of the Fathers generally and of the Church Primitive Secondly The Preface before the ten Moral Laws which containeth the date or time of their Promulgation by writing to me seemeth to be annexed to them on purpose to prove this Assertion concerning the fiâ—st establishment and original of the Seventh-day Sabbath For thus we read I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the Land of Egypt Thou shaâ—t c. By which it may appear that the publication of the Laws was after the deliverance out of Egypt Just so the Prophets date their Prophesies at the beginnings of them as The vision of Isaiah in the dayes of Uzziah c. And To Jeremiah the Isai 1. 1. Jer. 1. 1 2 word of the Lord came in the dayes of Josiah And In the first year of Jehoiakim's captivity the word of the Lord came expresly to Ezekiel Eze. 1. 2 3. the Priest The like we find in Daniel Amos Micha Zephani Haggi Zechari And in the Gospel also In the dayes of Herod And Caesar Augustus And Tiberius Luke 1. 5. 2. 1 3. 1. Caesar Here I desire the learned Reader to consider with me why it pleased the Divine Wisdom to put so late and low a date to the whole Decalogue of the Law Moral which we are well assured was in force from the creation of the first Man If not for this reason only bâ—cause there was something inserted and added to these Laws which was new and was not written in Man's heart nor ever imposed on the People of God untill they had been delivered out of Egypt And That new thing was this Ceremonial Precept of